Here's a little background on how this unfolded including my post on the "official" thread.
http://www.xbimmers.com/forums/showt...=624552&page=7
*I should point out that I replaced the battery due to a "Increased Battery Discharge" warning.*
I changed my battery less than three months ago (AGM) and programmed it via Carly. No issues until about a week ago. If it sits longer than a few hours I get "High Battery Drain" upon start-up on the HUD only. I took it to get it tested at O'Reilly's (suspected battery and that's where I bought it - three year warranty) and the alternator and battery are fine. Wondering if the IBS cable is the culprit or maybe CA door handles as some pointed out.
Anyone have any other ideas?
After not getting anywhere my journey began. The fear of constant drainage of the battery putting extra stress on the alternator and causing it to fail forced me to take action.
UPDATE:
I started troubleshooting this myself over the weekend. Comfort Access (CA) only worked on the driver side rear door and passenger side front door since I picked the car up. Never cared to mess with it. This weekend I removed all four door handles to see if my battery drain is somewhere there. Found nothing conclusive but decided to move the working CA handle on the drivers side rear to the front. Now both of my front doors work for CA and both rears do not.
Long story short, this DID NOT fix my "High Battery Drain" issue, I had little faith that it would. Some of the CA door handles not working has never gave me any trouble in the last 2 years I've owned the vehicle but I thought I'd check it out anyways.
IBS cable is in the mail. Will report back when I replace it.
NOTE: If the IBS cable doesn't fix my issue I may try to replace the non-working CA handles next.
UPDATE:
IBS cable did NOT resolve my issue. (I should add that the "original" IBS cable on the vehicle was the most up to date part available per part number.) Going to disconnect CA handles and see if that stops the drain.
UPDATE:
Did A LOT of research on the subject across various BMW platforms and came up with the following items that could be causing my high battery drain.
List is in order of occurrence:
Comfort Access Module malfunction (Handle or Module itself doesn't allow car to sleep)
Telemetric Control Unit malfunction (This unit controls GPS tracking and also Bluetooth)
Factory Alarm malfunction (Alarm battery dies and starts sapping power from main battery)
Radio malfunction (I didn't see a lot of this but will include anyways, Radio draws power even when off)
Decided to go with the two easiest to diagnose, the CAS and Alarm. I ALWAYS lock my car in the garage, so last night I decided to leave it unlocked. I also pulled the fuse for the CAS (#132 in trunk). NOTE: Disconnecting this fuse will also disable your speakers, Bluetooth, warning gong, radio, etc. so don't panic if that happens.
Result? NO "High Battery Drain" warning this morning. Since I carpool to work, I have left the vehicle in the usual spot LOCKED. IF the car has no warning when I come back to it today, it can only be the CAS. If I do get the warning, it's the Alarm system. If my assumptions are correct, it's the CAS and identifying which handle it is will be the next step. Really hoping its not the module itself.
UPDATE:
When I started the vehicle later in the day there was no warning. This meant that the issue was with the door handles. That night, I took off the two handles in the back and disconnected the CAS. Remember, the CA on these two never worked but also never gave me trouble.
Left the vehicle over night with the front two connected (both working) and the rears diconnected (both not) to see if the issue is at the front or the rear.
This morning started up the vehicle with no warning. Meaning one of the dead CA handles in the rear was the culprit.
Two solutions to fix the drain in my instance:
1) Troubleshoot further and find out if it's the left or right handle by leaving only the left or the right side connected over night. End result, either way, would be replacing both handles.
2) Leave both handles in the rear disconnected permanently. (Some would argue that this is not a solution at all, just masking the problem.)
I decided to go with solution number two. I rarely used the one rear handle that worked so having the rears not working is not an issue for me as long as both in the front work. Again, this only pertains to comfort access, handles themselves work fine.
NOTE: CA handle(s) can work as designed but can still draw too much power. They don't necessarily need to stop working for this to happen. Only way - that I know - to diagnose the problem in this instance is to monitor the temperature of the handle(s), they work but become warm/hot to the touch. They will eventually stop working but still drain your battery, and can short the circuit and blow your fuse when they go.
I hope this thread will help someone else avoid the headache of reading through numerous thread pages and sleepless nights wondering if the vehicle will start in the morning.
Hope this helps, good luck!
UPDATE:
Over the last couple of days, the driver side CA handle has been working intermittently. Finally, got a warning in the HUD. "Increased Battery Discharge." Pulled the handle and no warning the next day. I can no longer say, with confidence, that one warning is more specific than the other (High Battery Drain vs. Increased Battery Discharge).